PM Waterloo — April 16, 2026

Reimagining how we work

A framework for PMs shipping safely in production codebases

Babajide Okusanya | Disposable by Default

Originally planned

Product Discovery with
Reddit + Playwright

Automated extraction of what people are saying about your product or problem space. Claude + Playwright crawling Reddit threads, synthesizing pain points, signals, and opportunities.

I have this skill available — talk to me after if you want it.

But something more important came up.

The landscape

The PMs that are winning aren't doing
their old job faster. They're working differently.

33pt
gap between PMs reporting AI improved productivity (97%) vs. actual outcomes (64%)
30%
faster deliverable completion for PMs using generative AI — without sacrificing quality

The speed is real. But speed without direction is just moving faster toward the wrong thing.
You need a framework, not just a tool.

The engineering perspective

Your engineer isn't being difficult.
They're being responsible.

43%
of AI-generated code requires manual debugging in production — even after passing QA

The risk is real. But the opportunity is also real. So how do we bridge this?

The key insight

Frontend breaks are loud.
Backend breaks are silent.

ERROR VISIBLE

Frontend

You can see it. The page looks wrong. You catch it.

vs
api/v1/meetings api/v1/prospects api/v1/uploads silent failure

Backend

Looks fine. Fails silently. Could take days to find.

So giving non-technical people direct backend access is scary for any engineering team.
But blocking them creates the bottleneck everyone complains about.

So here's what I built.

The Concierge Pattern

The Concierge Pattern

A safe interface between your AI tools and the codebase

PM's Claude Code Frontend repo + CLAUDE.md rules MCP Server Broker + Auth + Credentials Concierge Managed Agent Understands the backend Backend Repo API, schemas, business logic Escalation → Slack Concierge decides when asks responds forwards returns reads

The PM never touches the backend directly. But they're not waiting two sprints either.

Outcome 1 of 3

"Use what exists"

PM's Claude Code
I want to show a progress bar on the onboarding screen. What data do I need?
Concierge
Already supported. Use GET /api/v1/users/:id/onboarding-status — it returns completed steps and total steps.

No ticket. No engineering time. This is the most common outcome.

Outcome 2 of 3

"Backend change needed"

PM's Claude Code
I want to let users skip steps in onboarding and come back to them later.
Concierge
No skip endpoint exists. Ticket OB-312 opened — "Add step-skip and resume to onboarding API." The agent pipeline will implement it and open a PR.

A background agent implements it. Engineering reviews and merges. You're not blocked.

Outcome 3 of 3

"Push back"

PM's Claude Code
I want to add a new user role for onboarding admins who can configure the flow.
Concierge
Hold on — the existing admin role already has onboarding configuration permissions. What specifically can't you do with it?

The premise was wrong. Concierge asks before acting — no unnecessary changes.

Escalation

Only bother engineering
when it's truly critical

Concierge → #cerebro-escalations
The PM's agent is requesting write access to the billing table to add a discount field. This touches payment logic — I need an engineering decision before proceeding.
Lead Engineer
Don't touch billing directly. Use the promotions service — it already handles discount logic safely.
Concierge → PM's Claude
Use POST /api/v1/promotions for discounts. I'll guide you through the request shape.

30 seconds of the engineer's time. The PM isn't blocked. Everyone moves forward.

1–2 hrs

An hour or two of internal tooling
that saves me a massive amount of time.

Every organization works differently. Your backend is different from mine. Your team dynamics are different. Your risk tolerance is different.

This isn't a SaaS product you buy. It's a pattern you build for your team.

Designers PMs Engineers
Speed Safety

"Honestly — the concierge is a great idea. Helped me a lot in knowing what to change and what not to as well!"

— PM using the Concierge Pattern

Babajide Okusanya

Disposable by Default

Babajide Okusanya

Founder, Disposable by Default

AI consulting. My job is to be the laziest person in the room but driving the biggest amount of outcome.

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